


just wanna know if you’re in love yet

by miragedark



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Accidental Confession, Anyways, First Kiss, M/M, Sharing a Bed, dumb fluff, i mean tattsun and mayoi are there too i guess?, take a shot every time aira calls something stupid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-21
Updated: 2020-05-21
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:20:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24302023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miragedark/pseuds/miragedark
Summary: aira’s a little sick of his big, fat, stupid, irritating crush on hiiro of all people keeping him up at night.
Relationships: Amagi Hiiro/Shiratori Aira
Comments: 11
Kudos: 123





	just wanna know if you’re in love yet

**Author's Note:**

> i redownloaded ensemble stars after two years of nothing approximately two weeks ago and i don’t know what to say besides hiiai is ABSOLUTELY canon
> 
> title from chase atlantic’s moonlight bc i’m trashy like tht

Aira had grown used to restless nights after moving into ALKALOID’s dorm. No matter how much Mayoi drilled him during training, no matter how many frustrating steps and re-steps he did as he committed choreography to memory, no matter how much every fiber of muscle in his body aches and complained, there were some nights where he simply couldn’t find sleep. 

The worst nights were the ones he spent inside his head, locked up by the infuriatingly mushy walls of his brain. Ever since their live first performance, he had been so acutely aware of how he was the weak link by such a huge margin. The inferiority was persistent, always lurking somewhere in the depths of his mind and rather akin to a shadow looming over him, the industry’s clawed hands hovering above his shoulders, ready to remove him from the stage should he continue to fall behind. Mayoi’s comment about the unit name sounding like an imitation of something hung heavy in his thoughts as well, reminding Aira that he was simply an imposter of the thing he loved so much. Those were the nights he tended to leave for fresh air, sometimes running into other members of the various production companies. Plenty of them seemed approachable enough, but Aira didn’t dare assert himself into their lives, assume that he was anywhere near their level or that they would give any care about his issues. Sometimes he wondered if they struggled with the same thoughts of inferiority that he did—but they all seemed so _confident_ on stage. 

Other nights, only _infinitesimally_ better, were spent restless as his brain instead conjured up _cascades_ of thoughts about Hiiro, who slept peacefully above him without any awareness. Even though Hiiro was so clearly driven, unashamed and bursting at the seams with energy on stage, he was so painfully _gentle_ with Aira. Encouraging without being forceful, inspiring without being arrogant. He seemed to like grabbing Aira’s hands whenever Aira was particularly moody, and even though the blonde had come to expect it, it made his heart jump every time. Not only that, but Hiiro had later picked up a habit of ruffling Aira’s hair on the basis that it was ‘soft’ and ‘smelled nice’. The only thing worse than Hiiro’s sense of social cues was Aira’s big, fat, _stupid_ crush on him, and so no matter how much it flustered him, no matter how much he acted irritated, he let Hiiro her away with it. 

While plenty of other units seemed close, they certainly weren’t _that_ close. Especially considering the stigma surrounding dating within the idol community, Aira didn’t doubt that his painfully obvious crush becoming common knowledge would be the final nail in the coffin of his too-short career. But he couldn’t control his thoughts like that, he told that nagging, pessimistic voice in the neck of his head. It wasn’t his fault that Hiiro’s pretty eyes were the same color as their practice uniform shirts, or that his hair had the texture of clouds, or that when he zoned out during meetings the dreamy look that fell over his face made Aira’s palms shake. He couldn’t stop himself from thinking about Hiiro’s warm hand in his, or what it would feel like to have Hiiro’s arms around his waist. After all, the first thing he’d learned about the other was how deceptively strong he was. It would be incredible, even _unreal_ to go on a _real_ , actual date with him, maybe to the movies or a restaurant _outside_ of the idol district. Maybe Hiiro couldn't _pay_ for that, in retrospect, but Aira wouldn’t mind shelling out extra yen for that experience. 

Sometimes as he lied there, staring up and wishing he had x-ray vision to see Hiiro through the bottom of that bunk (was that creepy? Was Mayoi-senpai rubbing off on him?), he practiced a confession. He’d never work up the nerve to actually utter a word of it, but that didn’t matter when he was stuck with nothing to do but curse layers of mattress and metal bars and his own hyperactive mind. It brought him a strange comfort to imagine delivering such a confession without a stutter; how Hiiro would take Aira’s hands into his own, and then they’d skip off into the sunset or something like that. Right? That was how confessions worked in fiction, right?

Aira rolled over with a sigh, staring blankly at Mayoi’s back across the room. Even the most wound-up person he’d ever met had better sleeping patterns than Aira. Ever since his unwilling insomniac episodes started, the blonde had memorized the pattern of the streetlights that bled through the window shades and dashed pale yellow light across the room in random intervals. Aira wondered if the lights flowed into the same patterns, dotted like morse code across the floor, from Hiiro’s bunk, or if they morphed somehow from the angling. Some nights, he had half a mind to just climb up there. Hiiro’s face was probably so peaceful asleep, those brilliant eyes covered in darkness and all of the daily emotion wiped from his features. Hiiro was so... _Hiiro (sometimes, there were no good adjectives for him)..._ that he probably wouldn’t be entirely bothered if he woke to Aira sitting at the foot of his bed. But, no, Aira couldn’t do that to him. The other trusted him, and it would be plain _wrong_ to take advantage of his peaceful, calm, safe sleep like that. 

Aira rolled back over, facing the wall with a grimace. Turning too hard out of frustration had jolted the bunk ever so slightly, and he hoped the movement didn’t wake Hiiro up. Closing his eyes once more, Aira tried to will himself to sleep. He needed to rest up for another long day of training rather than spend hours fantasizing about what it would be like to slip into Hiiro’s bed and curl against him like a spoiled cat. 

Unfortunately, the harder he tried to fall asleep, the harder it became to actually sleep. Feeling a frustrated headache come on, Aira rolled over into his back, holding an extra pillow to his chest and closing his eyes yet again. Maybe if he just stayed still long enough—

“Aira?”

The voice, definitely Hiiro’s, startled him entirely. The blonde found himself bolting up, sitting so fast that he nearly managed to leap from a sitting position out of his bunk—only to be stopped by the little metal ridge of the bunk above him colliding into the center of his forehead with a loud, hollow _clang_. Aira fell back immediately, hissing a few choice words under his breath with a palm pressed to his forehead, where he could already feel an uncomfortably quick pulse under the heated skin. His vision swam for a moment, between the blips of darkness, sudden burst of dizziness, and the way his eyes watered from impact. 

When Aira could look up again, Hiiro was frozen still next to his bed. He had crouched down, balancing carefully with his head thrown over his shoulder, undoubtedly trying to see if Tatsumi or Mayoi had been awoken by the sudden noise. 

“Did I startle you? Sorry.” Aira opened his mouth to make a sarcastic response about how with a broken skull he could _finally_ _be as stupid as Hiiro_ , but when he caught the genuine concern on Hiiro’s face it died in his throat. His eyes were wide, eyebrows raised slightly, gaze trained onto Aira. Hiiro had always been good, _unnervingly_ good at holding eye contact, and after a moment Aira’s watering eyes darted from the other’s to where the streetlights caressed the side of his face, sharpening the curve of his jaw and highlighting the way his hair stood up slightly, mussed by sleep. 

It took a moment for Aira to process the next few seconds, because suddenly Hiiro was moving and then Hiiro had leaned in and gently pressed his lips (god, they were as soft as they looked, _what the hell_ —) to the now throbbing, soon-to-be-lump in the middle of Aira’s forehead, brushing aside bangs with a gentle sweep of his thumb. He even took care to avoid the injury as he swept the blonde strands back. The light touch lingered on Aira’s skin for just a moment too long, as if it had left him branded by the silent fire that thrummed latent under Hiiro’s fingertips. 

“ _H—Hiro-kun?”_ Aira managed to stutter on an embarrassingly high pitch, trying desperately to hide the embarrassment in his voice with a note of scandalization instead. 

“Is something wrong?” 

Hiiro blinked back at him, those stupidly beautiful eyes wide and almost _curious_ in the darkness of ALKALOID’s room, and Aira suddenly felt the overwhelming urge to plant his face into the pillow on his lap and _scream_. Hiiro was so fucking _oblivious_ sometimes, wasn’t he? To just casually kiss a friend on the forehead with all the care of a _lover_ (stop projecting, Aira, he had to tell himself) and act like it was nothing was just something so... _Hiiro-esque_. Then again, to Hiiro, it probably was _nothing,_ and that realization sunk like a leaden anchor in Aira’s stomach. 

“Aira, are you okay?” Hiiro kept his voice low, but Aira was taken aback by how soft the tone was. “It would be bad if you got a concussion.” Bright eyes stared twin holes into Aira’s bruised forehead. Aira didn't know what to do besides aimlessly blink at the foot of his bunk and pretend that his heart wasn’t racing out of his chest. The racing pulse was probably audible in the silence of their room. Hiiro was leaning a little closer to him now, the faint warmth of his body radiating into the outer plane of Aira’s shaky arm. 

“Yea. Jus’ a nightmare,” he mumbled, only half-convinced by his own lie. It was better than the alternative. Stupid Aira, Hiiro was probably asking about his _splintered frontal bone_ , not the quality of his sleep and lack thereof. 

“I heard you saying my name.” There was a note of concern in Hiiro’s voice. Aira gave a half-hearted, bitter laugh at that, drawing his legs up closer to his body and wrapping his arms around them. Like that, he could no longer feel Hiiro radiating onto him like a heater. But not a contemporary heater, one of those old Western stovetops with intricate carvings that probably emitted as much carbon monoxide as it did heat. There was _definitely_ a metaphor in that which Aira couldn’t be bothered to pull apart. 

“Did you, now?” Aira laughed nervously. Hopefully that was all Hiiro heard. 

“I think so? You were mumbling. If you have a question, you should ask me before I fall asleep.”

Oh, Hiiro. Stupid, _stupid_ Hiiro. 

“Don’t worry about it, Hiro-kun. Just go back to bed,” Aira feigned a yawn, stretching his arms behind him. In truth, he wasn’t tired in the slightest, especially with the throbbing pain sitting in the middle of his forehead. But Hiiro didn’t need to know that, and he definitely didn’t need to know that Aira was awake because of his stupid, sappy daydreams. _I was just practicing confessing my undying love to you_ wasn’t really a good thing to drop on anyone in the middle of the night after they witnessed you slam your head into a metal beam, let alone someone dead set on being your best friend. 

Hiiro seemed to be good at taking _in_ and then relaying _out,_ creating something strangely beautiful and dangerous. Despite neither of them having picked it, the perceived irony of the name of their unit wasn’t lost on Aira—even if chemistry was a _horribly_ complicated subject and the furthest fathomable thing from idol work. But when Hiiro’s eyes went wide, showing white all around, and Aira felt his lips close even though he didn’t remember opening them, it seemed Hiiro had finally encountered something that came as a genuine shock to him. 

Shit, he’d _totally_ said that out loud. 

To hell and back with it. He could grovel at Tatsumi-senpai’s feet tomorrow for forgiveness, but for just a moment, Aira allowed himself to throw caution to the wind. _Bad idea!!! Horrible idea!!!_ his brain screamed, trying to slam on the emergency brakes as he drove towards Hiiro in a split second. It really wasn’t pretty or romantic when their lips met, more of an awkward crushing feeling and the realization that they both, in fact, had noses. 

After a moment in which time seemed to both freeze and accelerate infinitely, Aira pulled back, hanging his head. His teeth worried at his bottom lip absentmindedly. 

“Sorry, Hiro-kun. I—I really like you.”

Aira didn’t know what he expected, but it really _should_ have been the blank stare that he got. Hiiro had the emotional IQ of a Neanderthal. The idiot probably didn’t even know what a _crush_ was, let alone how to respond to his friend confessing so suddenly. 

Hiiro held three fingers to his bottom lip, hanging open ever so slightly. He stayed in place, as still as a statue as Aira stared at the wall behind him, preparing for his incredibly short-lived career to be executed then and there. Tomorrow morning Eichi would probably have him dragged behind the dorms and shot, or whatever else they did to idols who failed as horribly as himself. After a few moments of painful silence, a realization slowly seemed to dawn on him. The look in Hiiro’s eyes _softened_ , the corners of his lips twitching up into a genuine little smile. 

“Aira, move over a little bit.”

“Eh? What are you doing?” Despite his questions, Aira complied, letting Hiiro sit on the side of his bed and swing his legs up before immediately latching onto Aira and pulling him in to an awkward, diagonal hug. “Hiro-kun, what—?” Aira sighed, pushing lightly at Hiiro’s head. “I thought you wanted me to get sleep?”

“Aren’t you supposed to share a bed with people you _love_?”

Aira felt himself turn the color of Hiiro’s hair, sputtering out sounds as he tried to put together a coherent string of words. When it didn’t work and he remained silent, Hiiro began to pull back away, only for Aira to grab onto his arm and hold him in place. 

“You’re an idiot.” He hissed, but without any malice behind the words. Hiiro laughed, as if he could sense how much Aira was fronting. Instantaneously, he wrapped his arms tighter around Aira and pulled him down, unhooking himself just long enough to evenly distribute the blankets over the two of them. Then, he was back on Aira like a warm, nice-smelling _leech_ , and the blonde finally caved and leaned in towards Hiiro’s chest, careful not to press his forehead against it. “You actually like me, Hiiro-kun?” The words crashed over him like a cool wave of a _turquoise_ ocean on a hot summer day. 

“Of course I like you, Aira. You’re my friend. But I love you, too.” Just like that, Aira could taste his heartbeat for a moment. Almost instantly, Hiiro soothed (or maybe exacerbated) the overwound, jittery rush of nerves with a gentle kiss somewhere at the top of Aira’s head. He was really quite glad he wasn’t within Hiiro’s line of sight, and that the room was too dark to see the flaming color of his face. 

“Love you, too,” Aira muttered softly, just loud enough for Hiiro’s ears to pick it up. He was certain that if Hiiro could see him, he’d be teased for how he had turned pink up to the tips of his ears. A little giggle ( _cute!!_ ) accompanied the arms that tightened around him ever so slightly, a clear indication that the other heard him. Aira had always heard that you were never supposed to say the _‘L-word’_ on the first date, but maybe if he was saying it to Hiiro, that rule could bend a bit. 

After all, Hiiro was full of exceptions. He was the only idol that Aira allowed himself to get so close to so _quickly,_ while Aira appeared to be one of the only idols who Hiiro wasn’t dead-set on destroying. Rather, he seemed to want to elevate Aira even more, help him shine and bloom, so that they could conquer the stage _together._

Hey...that sounded pretty fun, right? Conquering the idol world with his... _boyfriend!?_ Maybe _that_ was the type of thought that could lull him into sleep with all of the promises for exciting tomorrows it carried. 

Needless to say, Aira got the best sleep he’d had in _months_. 

**Author's Note:**

> (●´ω｀●) (●´ω｀●) (●´ω｀●) your honor these are my emotional support gays  
> aira smacking his head is just the live footage of me seeing hiiro for the first time and falling in love instantly  
> anyways hiiai canon
> 
> psst follow me on twt @faithconquests!


End file.
